Paleo for the average Jane

Larb, or Thai meat salad

This beauty could be considered vaguely like Thai Larb, or a meat salad. There are certainly some strong Thai inspired flavors here, and really REALLY hit the spot. It’s usually made with sticky rice or crispy rice, but I obviously left that stuff out, and it was still delicious. When I was testing the recipe, I added some chopped cashews on top, but found I didn’t really need them. Feel free to do so, or peanuts if that is your thing. (By the way, to any Thai folks, I realize this is far enough from what it is supposed to be as almost to be offensive, but it’s totally because I love Thai food and couldn’t live without it…) I made mine with pork, but if you don’t like or should have pork (DAD!!!!!) chicken or turkey is fantastic as well. One last little note, then on to the main event, I promise: I used cukes, carrots, and radishes. I suspect a wide variety of veggies would be awesome here.

The Ingredients:

– 3 limes

– 1 tablespoon honey

– 1 teaspoon AND 1 tablespoon fish sauce (divided)

– 1/2 teaspoon sriracha

– TON of mint

– 1 onion

– 3 cloves garlic

– 1 lb ground meat (pork, turkey, or chicken)

– 2 carrots

– 1 cucumber

– radishes

– Lettuce to wrap meaty vegetable goodness in

– NOT SEEN: oil. I used coconut, but whatever works.

The Hardware:

– Small container with a good seal

– A good knife

– Measuring spoons

– Frying pan

– Food processor with shredder (Or a box grater, or a heavy duty grater, or just a knife)

– Rubber spatula

ALSO NEEDED!!

– A nice platter to arrange everything on

– Vegetable peeler

– Julienner

First things first, make the dressing first so that all the flavors have time to get all tasty and awesome. So grab three limes. Since this is the week of the lime, the drill should be known by now! Chop the suckers in half, and juice them into a small container.

Ta Da!!

Add a tablespoon of honey to it. I greased down the spoon a little so the honey would slide right out.

Add a teaspoon of fish sauce…

And half a teaspoon of sriracha.

Now, don’t scrimp on the fresh mint. This is one of the things that makes this whole dish SCREAM Thai. So grab the huge bunch of mint, and take the leaves off the stem and chop those puppies up.

Add the mint to the dressing…

Cover the container, and give it a good shake. This should get a good shake every once in a while while everything else is getting put together. Onto the meat!

Grab an onion…

Cut that sucker in half, and peel the paper skin off…

And chop it up. While it’s being chopped, add some oil into the frying pan over medium low heat. When it’s hot…

Add the onions into the pan. While those start cooking…

Grab three cloves of garlic and peel them.

Chop the garlic up…

And add it to the pan. Let that cook for a while…

Once the garlic and onions are mostly cooked through, add the pork to the pan.

Add a tablespoon of fish sauce to the meaty goodness in the pan. Let that whole delicious mess cook, and give it a stir occasionally, breaking up any chunks of meat.

Grab a couple carrots…

Peel them…

Julienne them…

And cut the julienned carrots in half. Trust me, while the long graceful sticks of veggies look amazing on a platter, they make a God almighty mess when being eaten. Trust me.

Arrange the carrots on a platter.

Grab the cuke, and repeat the whole process. Peel… (that picture seems to have disappeared?)

Julienne…

Cut in half…

And arrange on the platter.

Grab the radishes…

Trim the unsavory bits off…

And run them through the food processors grating attachment. Or box grater. Or just matchstick them. Whatever works.

Arrange those on the platter as well.

At this point, the pork mixture should be cooked through. PINK IS BAD. Make sure everything is cooked WELL.

Arrange the pork on the salad. Now, it’s actually much better if the warm pork gets dumped on top of all the veggies, as it allows the dressing to soak in and get tasty. But, I was trying to make it pretty. I failed. Whatever. Anyway…

Pour the dressing on top of everything…

And serve with lettuce to make wraps out of! Yum! Grab whatever quantities of veggies and meat float your boat, and gobble these suckers up!!